Victoria’s Secret > Lemons

I didn’t know how to properly pronounce “Lululemon” until I moved here. Up until then, I thought it was called “Lu-lee-MON” (I don’t always take the time to read things thoroughly). In New York, you’ll rarely find a yoga or barre class without a bunch of size 2 women decked out in $100 Lululemon yoga pants, and the brand has quite a bit of a cult following. I’ve never purchased anything from them before, simply because I love everything in the Victoria’s Secret workout collection, but I did pay attention to the bad press they received about their see-through pants and pilling material. Wasn’t it cute how the (now ex) co-founder blamed it on women whose thighs rub together? [See more details about the story HERE.]

I really don’t care what type of statements he made, but I did start paying attention to Lululemon-wearing women around the city. What did I notice? LOTS of skinny females walking around in their Lululemon bottoms that were very see-through. Mind you, off-color comments within the fashion industry really don’t bother me, especially after working in fashion for almost ten years. The thing that I did find shady was that their clothes were so low in quality. Sure, if you’re going to stretch a size small over  an XL, it’s not gonna work – but I was seeing women who were wearing their proper size, and the pants failed to actually cover their La Perla thongs. (Some of them weren’t even wearing thongs… *shudder*)

Case-in-point: I don’t really consider $100 exercise clothing to be extreme, as I’m a huge fan of the Lucy workout line and they’re in the same price range, but I don’t understand why people love Lulu so much. To put it plainly, part of me just thinks “Umm… the clothes aren’t even cute”. Seriously, that brand has the most bland-looking pieces ever… which would be fine if they were actually durable and functional. In that case you’d be paying for quality and not style, which can make sense. But boring + see-through + pilling + $100 = NAHHHHHH. As much as I respect brand loyalty, I don’t care how much of a trend Lulu is in this city – I’m still going to stick to my Lucy pants (I’ve been wearing them for 5 years and almost NO pilling) and my VS clothing because they have leopard prints and shiny details. Shiny things make me happy. And guess what? When you wear VS yoga pants, you can actually do the happy baby pose without flashing your birth canal through the fabric. Nice.